Strictly Business

The democratic party's most eloquent statesman in a triumph of heart, mind and voice. With the unmistakable fire that has lit up Democratic thinking for more than a decade, Mario Cuomo delivers "Reason to Believe" -- a vivid rebuke to the radical Republicans running riot in Washington, and a clear-eyed, common sense assessment of "where we are, where we're going, and what we should do about it." Forthright in confessing his party's own failings, Cuomo is remorseless in dismantling the opposition, using the floodlight of his clear prose to reveal the evasion and show the inadequacy of the now-famous, celebrated Contract with America. In its place, he offers a hopeful vision of what we the people might achieve if we can only learn to remember that "we're all in this together." Written with a depth of understanding drawn from twenty years of daily involvement with local, state and federal government and six decades as the American son of quintessential immigrants, "Reason to Believe" is Cuomo's tribute to the uncompromising wisdom of people like his parents and the parents of his wife, Matilda, seekers and believers who taught him the lesson America needs so badly now: "that what is right is usually also what is necessary; that in helping one another we almost always help ourselves."